Artist, Scientist, Explorer: Mark Catesby in the Carolinas

Featuring the British Royal Collection, this exhibition explores the incredible life and work of Mark Catesby, the English artist, scientist, and explorer who spent four years documenting the natural habitats of the Carolinas, Florida, and the Bahamas.

In 1722, Catesby arrived in Charleston and traveled throughout South Carolina and beyond documenting birds, reptiles and amphibians, fish, insects, and mammals indigenous to the American colonies. This four year sojourn resulted in a series of watercolors that documented the natural habitats of the Carolinas, Florida, and the Bahamas, and ultimately resulted in the first major work on the botanical and animal life of North America, The Natural History of Carolina, Florida and the Bahama Islands.

Artist, Scientist, Explorer: Mark Catesby in the Carolinas marks the first showing of Catesby’s original watercolors in Charleston, and only the second time his watercolors have been on view in the United States. The exhibition features 44 paintings on loan from Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II from the British Royal Collection.

To underscore the significance of Catesby’s masterful paintings, the exhibition will also include a selection of watercolors created circa 1733 by George Edwards (1694–1773). Like his friend Mark Catesby, Edwards created precise watercolor renderings of birds. In many cases the two artists painted the same subject matter, including a bird particularly important to South Carolina, the now extinct Carolina Parakeet. Collected by John Drayton in 1733, rediscovered in 1969, and recently conserved, the Edwards paintings will be on loan from The Lenhardt Collection of George Edwards Watercolors at Drayton Hall, a historic site of the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

This exhibition is made possible through the vision and financial support of the Gilbert & Ildiko Butler Family Foundation.

Additional funding provided by:

Mr. and Mrs. Benjamin F. Lenhardt, Jr.

Jill and Richard Almeida

Ann Long Fine Art

Mr. and Mrs. Robert Black

Mr. and Mrs. Kevin Cox

EWH Charitable Trust

Mrs. Roger Hanahan in honor of David J. Elliott, executive director of the Catesby Commemorative Trust

Mr. and Mrs. James R. McNab, Jr.

Woody and Peggy Rash

Jane O. Waring in honor of David J. Elliott, executive director of the Catesby Commemorative Trust

Visiting Artist Becca Barnet

Gibbes Archives House A Delightful Surprise

This summer, I have been interning with the Curatorial and Collections departments as part of a long-standing partnership between the University of Virginia’s Institute for Public History and the Gibbes…